Today, people have many digital media devices and media types available to them, such as digital cameras providing still pictures, DVD's and digital camcorders providing moving video, CD's and MP3 players providing audio, etc. Different software is required to deliver the different media using a personal computer (PC). Also, the user interfaces for the different media types are also different from each other. If, for example, a son wants to send digital pictures from his digital camera to his mother, she would need to have a PC, he would have to send the pictures via e-mail, and she would have to be e-mail savvy. The mother would also need the correct software to view the pictures. The son may have to talk his mother through the process of how to view the pictures on her PC. The pictures just exist in a large e-mail file and may be lost if the mother or son upgrades their PC by, for example, changing operating systems.
Also, if the son wants to show the pictures to people at his home, he would need to have everyone gather around his PC, which does not provide for a good sharing experience.
Also, certain types of sales and advertisement media and new music media are typically available from just a PC environment and are not accessible by a television. Currently, television provides mostly fixed media and not much interactivity as a PC and Internet environment may provide. A television viewer is essentially limited to watching fixed media including the same commercials that everyone else is watching.
Media devices may be battery powered, portable or mobile devices that are designed to operate while in motion (“roaming media devices”), or may be designed for operation while in a fixed location and usually connected to a power outlet (“stationary media devices”). Typical media devices, including media capture and player devices such as video and image cameras, audio recorders, and video, audio and image players, are designed for direct user control.
Direct control of such media devices occurs manually through buttons, switches and keypads on the media device or on an associated remote control device. With direct control, users have access to a wide set of device commands, such as power on or off, play, rewind, capture, erase, delete, zoom, rewind, skip, sleep, standby, volume, brightness, modes, scan, etc. Direct access to media (for playback, review, etc.) in typical media devices is but one result of direct control.
Many of such media devices also use displays, light emitting diodes, and other visual components to assist the user in carrying out direct control. Audible or audio components are also often employed to assist.
Most media devices offer no means for indirect control, and, for those that do, the indirect control is very limited and difficult to use. Indirect control is control that is initiated from an independent device that may or may not be operated by a user. Independent devices do not include remote control devices that communicate directly with the media device (associated remote control devices).
Further limitations and disadvantages of conventional and traditional approaches will become apparent to one of skill in the art, through comparison of such systems with the present invention as set forth in the remainder of the present application with reference to the drawings.